


The River and the Willow

by sannlykke



Category: Kuroko no Basuke | Kuroko's Basketball
Genre: Alternate Universe, Gen, M/M, MidoAka Month 2016, Wuxia, other characters to be added - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-06-22
Updated: 2016-06-27
Packaged: 2018-07-16 15:14:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,960
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7273231
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sannlykke/pseuds/sannlykke
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p></p><blockquote>
  <p>A thousand miles of oriole songs and red among the green<br/>Of wine flags flapping along the shore and in the hills<br/>Four hundred and eighty temples built by the Southern Court<br/>And how many pagodas in the land of mist and rain.</p>
  <p>Du Mu (803-852), <i>Jiangnan Spring</i><br/></p>
</blockquote><br/>Six loosely connected drabbles revolving around spring, the <i>jianghu</i>, and Midorima and Akashi's travels up and down the country.
            </blockquote>





	1. [立春] Start of Spring

**Author's Note:**

> Prompts for 6/20-23: **Wuxia** | Samurai | Children
> 
> ...I knew as soon as I saw these I wasn't gonna pass this chance up to wax poetic about wuxia lmao, so. Gonna post the first part now and update when I can.
> 
> Also I know it's summer but do you see that poem there?? One of my favorites and it's even color-coordinated with MidoAka. _(:'3

Shintarou felt eyes on him.

It was to be expected, as a stranger in a foreign land. The trip across the narrow channel had been rockier than he had thought, and only luck had pulled him through to see the port the next morning. 

The merchants and monks he traveled with had bid him farewell in Hangzhou, one group continuing down the Qiantang River, the other heading for the high mountains seeking respite. Shintarou bought a horse and went south.

Yet it was not the curious gaze of villagers and merchant-folk, nor of traveling retinues or begging monks. He held the reigns of his horse tightly, but made no move to stop. One should not bend to all the whims and wills of mere highwaymen, those men without purpose. Still, the sunlight grew dimmer and dimmer by the minute, and Shintarou did not yet see the inn that the townsfolk had said would be within half a day’s ride. It would make an awful lot of trouble, were he to stop here and let himself be ransacked.

Shintarou turns around, narrowing his eyes.

“I know you’re there. Come out.”

Four of them appeared almost instantly from the woods that lined either side of this stretch of the road. The tallest of them was shorter than Shintarou himself, but there was an aura of menace about him that made Shintarou’s fingers twitch for his sword.

“Not from around here, are you?”

“A foreigner alright, look at his clothes.”

“Do you have no manners?” Shintarou said, frowning. Their speech was different from the one he had learned to cross the ocean, and he found it difficult to follow their babble. “I have nothing you would want.”

One of the bandits eyed his embroidered pouch. _That_ , at least, was a universal gesture. “That. I want that.”

The others were as unsubtle; Shintarou could already see a glint of metal in the dying sunlight. “No.”

He let go of the reins, slapping the horse’s bottom hard enough that it bolts down the road, too fast for anyone to follow. The bandit yelled out something incomprehensible, but it was quickly silenced by Shintarou’s foot connecting with his head.

 _One down_. Not sooner than both of his feet were planted firmly on the ground again did he swing around, parrying the attack from behind with his sword. Shintarou had never doubted his abilities in battle before, but his best weapon was neither martial arts nor swordplay. He readied his stance again, watching the three circle around him like sharks.

“You shouldn’t have done that,” another one growled, and suddenly charged at him. Shintarou sidestepped the attack in a flash, bringing the hilt of his sword down hard on the man’s back. Immediately he went flat on the ground, but not before a searing pain on Shintarou’s right side also sent him doubling down. 

“How’d you like that now?” The leader leered at him, raising his own weapon. Shintarou could taste blood in the air. “You–”

“Leave him.”

The new voice rang out from behind, soft but commanding. The remaining bandits stopped, staring.

“Who the hell is–”

Friend or foe, the newcomer had given Shintarou an opening: he rammed an elbow into the bandit leader’s stomach, making him drop his cleaver in surprise. He veered to the right, catapulting himself away from the fray.

When Shintarou turned around, both of the remaining bandits were already on the ground, unconscious. He bit down on his lip, feeling the adrenaline fade away into a painful throb in his arm. Now he focused his attention on the newcomer, whose own sword had not even been drawn.

“Thank you,” he said. The tones felt a little warmer on his tongue this time. “For the assistance. My name is Midorima. Might I ask for yours?”

He might be small of stature, the redheaded newcomer, but one look into his eyes told Shintarou this man was a force to be reckoned with. “Of course. You did quite well, yourself, considering the circumstances. My name is Akashi.”

“You are also–” Shintarou blinked, shaking his head. Akashi’s accent was perfectly intelligible, indistinguishable from the language spoken back at port. In Shintarou’s haste he almost twists his tongue as he replies. “It is fortunate for me to meet someone from my own land here.”

“Fortunate, you say.” Akashi smiled benignly, extending a hand. “I suppose it must be. The _jianghu_ is not a kind place, though you will not have to look far for the good of it.”

“Oh?” Shintarou took his hand, pulling himself up. A little embarrassing to be saved, he thought, but at least– “I would like to know more about that. But I am afraid I must search for my horse.”

“Would she be a black mare?”

“–How did you know?”

Akashi shrugged, the knowing smile still on his face even as he turned towards the road. In the distance, Shintarou could finally make out a lantern swaying in the wind. “Just a lucky guess.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Definitions of 'jianghu' (from [Wiki](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wuxia#Jianghu)) just for reference:
>
>> Over the centuries, "jianghu" gained greater acceptance among the common people and gradually became a term used to describe a sub-society parallel to, and sometimes orthogonal to, mainstream society. 
>> 
>> A common aspect of the jianghu is that the courts of law are dysfunctional and that all disputes and differences (within the community) can only be resolved by members of the community, through the use of mediation, negotiation or force, predicating the need for the code of xia and acts of chivalry. Law and order within the jianghu are maintained by the various orthodox and righteous sects and heroes. Sometimes these sects may gather to form an alliance against a powerful evil organisation in the jianghu.


	2. [雨水] Rainwater

“It might rain soon,” Akashi says, glancing out towards the lake.

Shintarou picks up his cup of tea. Mist had already gathered across all that he could see, white reflecting the blue-black of the lake surface. If he has become certain of one thing whilst traveling with Akashi, it is this that his predictions always come true. “You mean it _will_ rain.”

“Yes.”

Not a second more after the word had left his lips does the first drop _plock_! down on one of the stone lions guarding the entrance to the pavilion. And then another, and another. Shintarou looks up at the worn stone pillars, noting the weathered lettering on each, and he cannot help but recall them to the tip of his tongue. “ _Two red chambers fronting the cold, hidden by the rain--_ ”

“ _\--and a lantern on a pearl screen, swaying my lone heart homeward_ ,” Akashi finishes, his fingers tracing the shallow etching. “Do you miss it?”

“In time.” _I cannot go home just yet_. He downs the rest of the tea, jade swirls of tea-leaves leaving a trace of the sharp aroma on his lips. The food in this part of the country is mellow and sweet, the rain an unrelenting constant, but he has found himself slowly becoming accustomed to either one.

And the lake, sprawling expanse that it is, still holds many secrets. Out of the corner of his eye Shintarou can see a black umbrella moving slowly towards them down the cobblestone. “This is excellent tea.”

Akashi pulls the strings of the silken bag back into a neat bow. “Longjing from Lion’s Peak, a gift from Magistrate Liu. He is very thankful for our assistance on the monastery case last week.”

Shintarou purses his lips. “Ah. Quite a nasty affair.”

He isn’t entirely sure what to make of this new sort of existence, in the lull between trying to find a cure for his sister’s ailment and somewhat reluctantly following Akashi around the country, dispensing justice (and more often than not sharp words and hidden exchanges that never quite fit the image he’d had of what he’d supposedly be dealing with here). Akashi, nor any of his strange acquaintances for the matter, is not a deputy or even a local official, but it has become increasingly clear by the day that there are not many who would challenge his word in that particular area.

“One would hope that to be the end of it.” Akashi sighs, then turns his attention towards the newcomer. “Nijimura-san. More trouble down at court, I presume?”

“Does it seem like that’s all I ever ask after you for?” Nijimura shakes the umbrella, and a frog, disgruntled, leaps off one of the stone steps in the same curve of water. “But yes. Unfortunately. Would you two come back to town with me? I don’t think--”

“Let’s wait until the rain stops, Nijimura-san.”

Shintarou jumps at the unfamiliar voice, and it seems a shorter man has popped out of nowhere between them. Nijimura sighs. “Midorima, Kuroko, you haven’t met yet...?”

“We have not,” Kuroko says. Shintarou nods, noting the vivid blue pattern on the hilt of his sword, identical in all but color to the one Akashi carries. There _are_ more of these people out there, he knows from Akashi’s offhand comments, but he had not expected to meet one so soon. “Akashi-kun has mentioned you in several letters, Midorima-kun. Are we intruding onto something?”

“Well, no, not at all,” Shintarou replies, then wonders why those words came out the way they did. Akashi is watching them without speaking a word, but he can tell the redhead is somehow pleased with all of this. “But yes, perhaps until the rain stops.”

If it were ever to do so. The mist is thicker now, obscuring the pagodas and other buildings along the edge of the lake. Their conversation drifts from language to language, murmuring when met with unsavory details, and Shintarou knows even here among the reeds and willows there might be others listening.

Not so different, really, from what he is used to. He pours more tea for the others, until Akashi places a hand over his. “Do you hear that?”

“Akashi...?”

Then he hears it, the clear notes of a flute. Kuroko inclines his head, and Nijimura puts down his cup. Shintarou, for the matter, is confused, but not so entirely against the feel of Akashi’s hand over his own. The weather is yet cold, after all. “Is that what this business is about, Nijimura-san? The death of the flute-player.”

“Not dead yet, as you can tell.” Nijimura brings out a slip of paper, tied to a broken piece of arrow. “Though I wish he would keep quiet, but you know how he is. Tonight, it says.”

Akashi looks straight into Shintarou’s eyes. Shintarou sighs. “Right. Okay.”

“It would not be for long.” 

By then the rain has lessened slightly, though there is no sign of the clouds dispersing. Nijimura and Kuroko depart first, after thanking them for the tea, and Shintarou watches the black umbrella move down the path, trailing water in its wake. “I swear I have never met someone with such little presence.”

“Which will greatly aid us tonight, in fact,” Akashi says, pouring out the dregs in the teapot. “And you do know Kiyoshi has connections to the one you seek.”

Shintarou closes his eyes briefly, before reluctantly sighing. Few know what the Xiyu Doctor even looks like, and fewer still have been treated by their miraculous cures. This is a thread he could not bear to lose, but even more than that... “I know.”

“Then, shall we?”

The morning’s divination had projected a day of excitement for him, though the wetness not a terribly auspicious sign in his book. Still, that is the least he has to worry about. Shintarou pulls his coat over his head, watching his footing on the slippery steps, and waits until Akashi is near enough before moving forward. “Wait.”

“Hm?”

Akashi carries a look of resignation on his face that Shintarou had not seen before. “I’ve forgotten my coat at the inn.”

“Oh.” And then, realizing what he’d just said, Shintarou could not help but feel a strange, creeping flush up the side of his neck. Perhaps it is the humidity getting to him. “Um, well--”

“Could I be so forward as to share your coat, Midorima?”

“Yes, it...it is no problem.”

The flute-music does not fade even as they make their way back to town, on worn stone steps, with newly-sprouted grass slowly slipping up through the cracks. Despite it having been not more than three weeks since the last snow fell, he does not feel so cold anymore, in this land of mist and rain.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter 3 will be an immediate continuation of this one (wow! There is some semblance of a plot??? For two chapters at least???)
> 
> Also, just because I haven't mentioned it yet, most of these drabbles are inspired by Qixia Wuyi, which sets this in the Song Dynasty (approx. 960-1279.) The poem they recite is part of "Spring Rain" by Li Shangyin (813-858.)


End file.
